Monday, February 27, 2017

Vintage cars have some unique cooling system issues that
differentiate them from modern vehicles used for day-to-day
transportation.We may be able to
address those issues with waterless coolant – a derivative of traditional
cooling technology.

Conventional coolant boils between 212-240 degree, depending on formulation and system pressure.Engines need to be warm to run efficiently,
so they have thermostats to regulate running temperature.With a thermostat that opens at 180 degrees
there is only a narrow margin between the minimum running temperature and boil
over.That’s one reason most cars have
radiator caps with springs that allow them to build up pressure like a pressure
cooker at home. The pressure raises the boiling point, increasing the safety
margin to an acceptable level.At least
that’s the idea.It works well in newer
cars but not so well for vintage iron.

Older engines often have parts that are weakened by
age.The 10-15psi of constant cooling
system pressure puts a stress on those parts and at some point they will begin
to fail.The result is a messy cooling
system leak.Such leaks are quickly
washed away on ordinary cars but cause hours of cleanup on collector vehicles.

Vintage engines often have buildup of deposits in the
internal cooling system passages.They
create hot spots inside the engine where temperatures exceed the boiling point
of even pressurized coolant.That reduces
cooling efficiency and can lead to overheating.

One cause of deposits is corrosion, which happens when the
elements of the engine react with the coolant.Surprisingly it is often the water in coolant that precipitates those
reactions.That’s why most car
manufacturers call for regular coolant changes.

Another approach to combating corrosion is to eliminate the
water altogether.Evans waterless
coolant is essentially a blend of glycols with no water added.By itself Evans coolant has a boiling point of 375 degrees, far hotter than a car’s cooling system will ever get in
normal running.The higher boiling
point means the cooling system will not build up as much pressure, and so will be less
likely to leak.If it does leak it will
not spray under pressure as aggressively as it would in a conventional system.

There is a tradeoff to the higher boiling point coolant -
efficiency.Water is better at
transferring heat than any glycol coolant, as long as it’s not boiling. That's the key. Engines with hotspots will almost always do
better with Evans because boiling is reduced or eliminated.When that is not a factor, vintage cars often
have enough cooling system capacity to hold their usual running temperatures
with the Evans coolant.Other vehicles may run somewhat warmer due to the lesser efficiency, but that will not generally endanger the engines.

Water in its liquid state is indeed a superior heat transfer fluid but as soon as it turns to vapor that advantage is lost. Water vapor only has 4% of the heat transfer ability of liquid water. Another way to think about that is that cooling water loses 96% of its efficiency when it starts to vaporize. If that happens under heavy throttle things can go bad in a hurry. Localized hotspots are the main source of transitory engine seizure. The photo below shows a dramatic example of what happens when coolant boils away from a cylinder liner. In a high end car this may be $50k of damage, perhaps substantially more.

Use of Evans coolant reduces the likelihood of such a failure in most collector cars. In that sense it's like using synthetic lubricant in the transmission where the higher breakdown temperature gives a huge additional margin of safety. Evans provides the benefits of reduced
corrosion and reduced pressure buildup/diminished likelihood of spraying leaks.

There are two considerations when using Evans coolant in
vintage race applications, or when driving very hard. Water is obviously not flammable, but any straight
glycol coolant (conventional antifreeze or Evans) is.There is a potential fire hazard if hot
glycol coolant is sprayed on exhaust manifolds in a crash.The other concern in a crash is that glycol
coolants are slipperier than either straight water or water/glycol mixes.Some tracks ban it for that reason.Spilled glycol can cause crashes.

Tests and calculations show that a typical water/glycol mixed conventional coolant will build a pressure of 16psi at 230F in a non running but hot engine. The same system with 100% Evans would only hold a pressure of 2psi. That is a substantial difference in "spray pressure" if a leak should occur.

In the non-racing vintage car community the benefits of
waterless coolant generally outweigh the disadvantages.The reduction of cooling system pressure
extends life, and the removal of water reduces the likelihood of corroding
hard-to-replace parts.Finally the
higher boiling point gives a great margin of safety for older cars that are
driven in parades.

No coolant is good to drink, but conventional coolant is most assuredly deadly where Evans is much less toxic. In the UK Evans is actually listed as non-toxic, but USA government rules dictate any fluid containing more than 10% ethylene glycol be labeled as toxic. If you
do develop leaks that can be a vital point of difference to your pets.

When you make the decision to change to waterless coolant
it’s important to install it correctly.Traditional coolant is simply drained and refilled with little regard
given to mixing.When installing
waterless coolant we need to remove all the old coolant – and all the water –
to get the full benefit of the technology.The best way to do that is with a dedicated flushing machine.At Robison Service we use a machine from
Mahle, a German manufacturer.The flush
machine pumps fluid into one end of the system and removes it from the other, ensuring
a smooth transition with little intermixing.

Most of the time you will not need to make any changes in
the system when switching to waterless coolant.Some cars will do best with changes to the thermostat or electric fan
settings.A few cars with marginal
cooling capacity will not have sufficient heat removal capacity; most of the
time when that happens it points to a longstanding cooling system problem, not
a problem with the new coolant.

Once you have made the switch it is important to only top
the system with Evans coolant.Topping
with water will dilute the Evans benefits.Evans sells coolant in gallon bottles to facilitate this. They also sell their Prep Fluid (usable for top-off) in quart containers.Remember systems with Evans tend to leak less
because of the reduced pressure.

When planning the installation of Evans coolant remember
that traditional antifreeze is mixed 50-50.If you needed two gallons of regular coolant and two gallons of water you
will need 4 gallons of Evans. You will
also need an initial supply of Evans Prep Fluid to clean out the system.When changing a 4 gallon system to Evans you
should expect to use up to 5 gallons of flush/prep coolant and 4 gallons for
final fill.

The line that carries old coolant out of the engine has a clear spot so you can tell when the new coolant begins to appear. See the image below:

Once filled, you should check to be sure your water content is under 4%. We use a refractometer for that purpose, as shown in the photos below:

Remember, whatever you do, old coolant should always be
recycled, not poured into the sewer.

John Elder Robison is the general manager of J E Robison Service Company, celebrating 30 years of independent Lamborghini, BMW/MINI, Mercedes, Land Rover, Rolls-Royce and Bentley restoration and repair in Springfield, Massachusetts. John is a longtime technical consultant to the car clubs, and he’s owned and restored many fine British and German motorcars. Find him online at www.robisonservice.com or in the real world at 413-785-1665

Reading this article will make you smarter, especially when it comes to car stuff. So it's good for you. But don't take that too far - printing and eating it will probably make you sick.

Sunday, February 26, 2017

We have the great fortune to see a lot of interesting cars at our Springfield shops. Can you identify all the cars in these photos, from the past 6 months?

John Elder Robison

(c) 2017 John Elder Robison

John Elder Robison is the general manager of J E Robison Service Company, celebrating 30 years of independent Lamborghini, BMW/MINI, Mercedes, Land Rover, Rolls-Royce and Bentley restoration and repair in Springfield, Massachusetts. John is a longtime technical consultant to the car clubs, and he’s owned and restored many fine British and German motorcars. Find him online at www.robisonservice.com or in the real world at 413-785-1665

Reading this article will make you smarter, especially when it comes to car stuff. So it's good for you. But don't take that too far - printing and eating it will probably make you sick.

Friday, February 24, 2017

Last fall I wrote a post on trailering collector cars.We do a lot of hauling and many of our
vehicles are big, heavy vintage Bentleys.We’ve seen the ongoing discussion on how to secure the cars and we wish
to weigh in with a fresh opinion.

When hauling over rough roads – like I-95 in New England
winter – or when hauling into cities like New York or Boston – there is a risk
of the car moving and banging the wheel boxes of the trailer if not well
secured.

We hauled this vintage Continental to a Bentley event in
Manhattan using crossed tie down straps and found the car moved almost a foot
side to side because the roads were so rough.The photo shows the car in the trailer as we consider using straight or
crossed straps, but either arrangement allows the car to move up and down
freely on the suspension and that is the problem.

No matter how tight you cinch the straps the car still
moves.When it moves down the straps
loosen and when it goes up they bang and stretch and loosen a bit and before
you know it the back can move over bumps.You think crossed straps prevent that but the angles involved are not
sharp enough and they don’t.

There is one positive way to prevent it and we are now doing
that on all Bentley and other big cars we move.That is to lash the wheels to e-track strips on the floor.The photos below show a typical e-track
installation, where there are several strips to accommodate varying track
widths.

The e-track system we use relies on straps that pass over
the tires and run to ratchets in front and behind the vehicle for ease of
setting.The tires are wedged in front with
wheel chocks so the car is initially tied down as far forward as it can
go.Then the e-track straps are passed
over each of the four wheels and clamped tight.

Now the car can move freely up and down and nothing
happens.No loose straps, no movement.You don’t have to worry about rough roads or
hard stops.

I used to be afraid that e-track was “light duty” but the
straps are rated for 4,000 pounds and with 4 of them on a 5,000 pound car you have a
large margin of safety.The e-track
strips we use are bolted through the trailer frame with nuts, bolts, and
washers.Many trailer places install
e-track with self tapping screws and we think that can be dangerous with heavy
cars.

It’s the best thing we have seen to date, easy to use, and
long lasting.

John Robison

(c) 2017 John Elder Robison

John Elder Robison is the general manager of J E Robison Service Company, celebrating 30 years of independent restoration and repair of Crewe-built motorcars in Springfield, Massachusetts. John is a longtime technical consultant to the national Bentley and Rolls-Royce car club (rroc.org), and he’s owned and restored many fine British motorcars. Find him online at www.robisonservice.com or in the real world at 413-785-1665

Reading this article will make you smarter, especially when it comes to car stuff. So it's good for you. But don't take that too far - printing and eating it will probably make you sick.

We are open from 8-5, Monday through Friday. There is a key drop in the front garage door for people who leave cars after hours.

We are New England's leading four-star authorized Bosch Car Service facility. Owner John Robison is a technical consultant to the Rolls Royce and Bentley owner clubs, the Land Rover club, and the BMW and Mercedes clubs. We're tech inspectors for the Porsche Club of America for regional track events. John's writing appears in many automotive magazines.